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Staff Pick: Stella Bain by Anita Shreve

In 1916, an American woman wakes up with amnesia in a French hospital. She remembers her duties as a nurse’s aide and ambulance driver and that her name is Stella Bain…or is it? Dr. Bridge, a cranial surgeon who nurses Stella back to health, helps get her an appointment inside the British Royal Navy’s headquarters. While there, a former friend recognizes Stella, and Stella’s memories begin returning – like why she left her home and what drove her to the French battlefields. As Stella’s story unfolds, Shreve takes us back and forth between Europe and the United States, before and after WWI. Shreve vividly examines trauma, shell shock, and memory loss while effectively tracing a woman’s journey to recover her past.